


they say that the world was built for two

by ohmyvalar



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Additional Warnings In Author's Note, F/M, Forbidden Love, Worldbuilding, possible artistic license taken with lore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-18
Updated: 2018-07-18
Packaged: 2019-06-05 01:21:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,673
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15159308
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohmyvalar/pseuds/ohmyvalar
Summary: Pre-Mortis. The Ones and the beginning of their end.





	they say that the world was built for two

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MiriamKenneath](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MiriamKenneath/gifts).



> This is my first gift fic for an exchange; I hope you like it, dear prompter/giftee! ^_^
> 
> To prevent spoilers, content warnings are in the end notes below!

In the beginning there was the One. 

Within him, as with all of his kind, the galaxy - and its manifestation of will which some called the Force - had invested an immense innate power. For millennia the Celestials ruled the vast expanses of the galaxy in its dawning years, shaping and crafting its unrealized potential into corporeal forms, content to serve as architects of the highest order. 

But the endlessly spinning wheel of Fate was impartial even to the galaxy's first and most favoured beings. The Celestials’ free reign over the universe was not to last. The scales tipped, and the balance of power within the galaxy was irrevocably altered. The slave race of the Rakata unleashed unspeakable curses on their former masters; magic so powerful that even the Celestials could not nullify. 

Only a handful of the once proud race escaped. They scattered throughout the galaxy like rats, diminished and disillusioned, while the Rakata’s influence spread like a dark shadow in the void of their absence. 

Alone, the One wandered the galaxy until he found a planet quite unlike any other. 

It was a shifting, mysterious thing, created to possess its own will. The moment he reached out with his senses the planet revealed itself to him. 

Images of its lush flora and bountiful fauna flashed through his mind, a tantalising paradise after his time as a homeless fugitive. But beneath that veneer the One detected a deeper undercurrent of immense power, one intrinsically linked to the Force. 

Instinctively, the One knew: this was a planet of infinite potential - as dangerous as it was hopeful. 

And that, above all else, was why he decided to settle down on the planet. 

By then the One was with young. And as he molded the planet to suit their needs, the One received a vision from the future - his children’s fates and lives were destined to be intertwined with their new home. It was both the price and gift the planet had exchanged for hosting their presence on its unmarked lands. 

They were twins; born in the form of two shining spheres as all Celestials were, blindingly bright. But away from the core of their power, their race was no longer what they once were. The One himself was a pale shadow of his former might; and his children were even weaker. 

But just as it seemed that the twin orbs might dim and dwindle into non-existence, wispy swirls of energy rising from the ground fused themselves to them. 

The orbs fed on them, rejuvenated; they steadily grew in size and strength. Encouraged, the planet gathered more of its life-force into its newest inhabitants. As the strings of energy grew thicker, it was visible that one was pitch black while the other was pure white. 

All the while, the planet rumbled as it once again changed its landscape to accommodate its residents. The One sensed, rather than saw, its infinite well of power subtly parting into two separate channels. On the physical plane, two locations on opposite sides of the planet began emanating competing cosmic energy levels. 

Something had changed in the balance of power on the planet. Before, it was only the One and it silently measuring each other. Now the planet had ensured that perfect balance would always be achieved by playing his children against each other. 

It was all audacious and preposterous. Once upon a time it had been a Celestial who created the planet in the first place. And now it was daring to control and manipulate its creators… 

_But the Celestials are no more,_ the planet whispered in its wordless form of communication. _Just as the Rakata rose up, so shall we serve our turn upon you. You are nothing now but our disposable guests._

The words burned into the One, a taunt more cutting for its self-righteousness. Once he could have destroyed the planet for its impudence at a snap of his fingers. 

And yet he was not as powerless as it wanted him to believe them to be. 

Even stripped of the ability to shape space as he wished, the One possessed a greater accessibility to the Force than any of the other, newer beings slowly awakening in the galaxy. He had found a powerful source in the planet, and he knew that that was why it chose to welcome them too. 

The planet may have trapped them here with its mixed blessing - but it was equally baring its resources to them for the taking. 

And so the One looked to himself, closed his eyes in sufferance, and reinvented himself. 

No longer were they Celestials; nor was he the One. For he was not alone any more. 

Looking down at his children, their features appearing as their glow faded, he let out his first genuine smile since the fall of the Celestials. 

No, he was no longer alone. And he would protect his children from the planet and anything else that might threaten them. 

From now on they would be the Father, the Daughter and the Son. 

-

The Son lay under a field of dying stars. Asteroids pulsating with otherworldly power arced down with destructive force. The ground shook, a warning of disaster to come. All around the flora and fauna called out to him in wordless groans and moans. The planet was crumbling upon itself and threatening to take them with it. 

But the Son was not afraid. 

No, he was feeling far from fear. The planet was all he knew - but they were made for greater things. The Father did not always divulge stories from their past, but from what the Son could piece together their race was once the ruler of planets, not guests to one. 

No, more than that - he _knew_ it. Something hummed at the very core of his being; some untapped well of unrealized power. He was greater than this planet and its will, perhaps greater even than his father and sister. 

And it was this same familiar tune that whispered to him now: _come, come to me now… become who you are destined to be._

As the words echoed in his mind, oddly compelling dark tendrils slithered towards him, twisting and curling around him. He lay at the center of this gurgling, snaking mess - but not as its victim. Oh, no - even as the tendrils suffocated him he could feel unfathomable energy seeping into him and gathering at his core. They were infusing its power into him; and once it was done - 

As he stared up at the stormy sky, paralyzed, a gleam of light suddenly broke through the darkness. It fought valiantly against the encroaching blackness, its glowing might vanquishing all in its way. 

But it was too late. His mastery over the darkness was all but complete. Thrusting his hand out against the sky, he shot a debilitating blow at the light. 

Fatally wounded, the ball of light shrunk and fell like a comet, heading straight for him. He was about to muster up another blast when he saw it: the light was reaching out to him in the shape of a familiar hand. He flinched as if struck by an invisible blow. That was the way _she_ always -

“Hey! Sleepyhead! Wake up!” 

The Son’s eyes snapped open instantly. Reflexively his senses reached out, calibrating his surroundings. Nothing significant had happened in the time that elapsed during his nap. The flying beasts above streaked past the sky. Beneath him was the same old texture of his favorite grass field. The Father was off somewhere tending to his secrets. They were - of course - still on the planet. All was well. 

Beside him knelt the Daughter, casting a shadow over him. As she moved the light shone into his eyes. The Son winced, crossing the back of his arms over them. “A very good morning to you too, sister.” 

He smelled more than he saw her lean down over him. Silken tresses bearing the scent of flowers tickled his cheeks. A warm hand clasped his arm. “You're always so cold, brother.” 

The Son exhaled against where he knew her face to be. The barest of pauses elapsed. Then the Daughter was pulling his arms away from his face with her deceptive strength. “Hey, you little -!” 

He let his arms fall away to his sides with a smirk - a smirk that fell away too when he saw her face. 

Somehow he always pretended to himself that she did not affect him like she did. And the illusion was forever smashed into pieces every time he looked upon her face. 

There she was again, her pale skin dusted pink with high color like a peach in spring. Those green eyes, staring reprovingly down at him. Her royal red lips were shaped in a pout.

Without thinking he reached out to her. Her cheek was as warm as ever to his touch, and her lips parted for him like it was the most natural thing in the world. 

The inside of her mouth tasted of fresh fruit ripe from the first touch of summer. He chased the familiar sweetness with his tongue, until she pulled away with a regretful but resolute shake of her head. 

Indignant at the abrupt end to what he knew they both wanted, he attempted to coax her back. But firm fingers cupping either side of his face held him still. 

Emerald eyes gazed deeply at him. They were steady and calm; there was barely any sign of the aroused passion he knew was clearly reflected in his own. 

He shut his eyes, breathing out in a long exhale. “Why do you always have to pretend that you don't want this as much as I do?”

“You know what Father said,” she answered. Her mouth was red and slightly swollen. It made him want to kiss her more. “You know what he wishes us to do.”

“What? Not love each other?” Leaning back, he gestured towards their surroundings. “Because let's face it, sister - there's not much else around here for us to love.”

A flash of hurt flickered across her blossom of a face. _Good,_ he thought childishly. _I shouldn't always be the one hurting._

She took his hand. As always, the drastic contrast between their body temperatures was a familiar shock. “Brother. I would always love you.”

He looked away. _That isn't what I meant and you know it._ Talking to his sister could be exasperating sometimes. She was being neither obtuse nor condescending, but when she put her mind to a particular mindset trying to change it was like smashing a rock into a river - the surface rippled, but nothing ever broke through. 

Slowly, gently, she pulled him to her and rested their foreheads against each other. 

Thus connected under the guise of acquiescence, he stared guiltily at her closed eyes. At the long eyelashes flitting against pale skin like pinned butterflies. 

Like this, calm and unguarded, she looked… Pliant. Harmless. _Weak._

His dream came back to him in flashes. He was the herald of the Dark, destined to destroy the Light… 

A shudder rippled through the Son. Sensing his discomfort, the Daughter stepped back. 

“Father is calling for us. We must go to him now.” 

She held out her hand to him. The Son stared at it for a moment, remembering - then took it. 

They crossed the grassy plains and tumultuous oceans, one after the other. 

The Daughter danced on ahead, her steps light and airy. A halo of soft glow enveloped her frame. The Son followed, lost in dark thoughts that weighed his movements down. If he were conscious of it he would have noticed the darkness hanging over him like an ominous shroud. All around them, the planet hummed and morphed itself accommodatingly.

The Father awaited them by a cavernous cave at the edge of the planet. Clothed in his wizard’s robes embroidered with a series of ancient protective charms along its hem, he leveled all-seeing eyes at his children. 

Whereas the Daughter smiled sweetly, the Son shifted restlessly. He never liked the way their father treated them; between his roles as parental figure and sole elder kinsman there was little space left for the empathy that paved the way to a congenial relationship. 

He silently wondered if the Father could skim their minds for what they'd just been doing. _Try it,_ he wordlessly dared, knowing it was a bad idea to taunt their austere father. _Try saying it out loud to me for once, instead of always dripping manipulative poison into your daughter’s ears under the pretense that it's all for my own good…_

The Father’s gaze alighted on him long enough for it to be piercing - but then he glanced away without censure. 

“I have never elaborated on the nature of our kind’s role in the galaxy, for we are the last of a dying race - and there is nothing more despairing and futile than the faux-nostalgia of diminished descendants longing after their awesome ancestors’ deeds.” On that cryptic note, their father turned to his daughter, who was listening attentively. “But now I sense a great disturbance in the fabric of our existence. Insignificant and powerless I may now be, but this yet remains within the realms of my duty. I must leave to investigate.”

At this, the Son broke his silence, no longer content to be blatantly ignored by his father and sister. “Why don't you let us go with you?”

His sister glanced reprovingly at him. _That's no way to speak to Father…_ She chastised telepathically. 

He ignored her and raised his mental shields. One of these days she was going to have to choose a side between him and their father anyways. He was just preparing her for that eventuality. 

Predictably, the Father shook his head sternly. “No. You will stay here where your sister can look after you - where you can look out for each other.”

The Son ground his teeth at the insinuation of that last sentence. The Daughter beamed, clearly enthused about being - as always - identified as the mature, responsible sibling. 

“Of course, Father. Please rest assured that Father and I will take care of our planet in your absence.” His sister was pledging, ever the tune-pleasing lark when it came to Father. 

The Son opened his mouth to further argue his point - but the Father was already turning his back to them. He drew his hands in a circle; immediately, a portal burst into life. 

“Remember all I have ever said to you, my children.” Their father reminded as he stepped into the portal. Its iridescent lights refracted off of his robes in dazzling rays. 

Despite a twinge of old fondness for their father’s protectiveness, the Son rolled his eyes openly. _What could happen in the span of whatever centuries your mission takes?_

The Father stared in stern disapproval at him. “You must understand that we are merely guests of this planet, not its masters. And no guests - however distinguished - should ever make the fatal mistake of usurping their hosts.” He continued lecturing as the rest of his body disappeared into the closing portal. “We shall speak further on this when I return - It is crucial that you understand our position-" 

The portal zipped up before he could hear whatever else their father was going to say. _Thank the powers for small miracles._ The Son stuck a rude gesture out at the space from which their father had teleported away.

He turned to share a conspiratorial glance with his sister - but only caught her turning her face away from him.

His heart sank. All right, so thinking that his sister would side with him against their father might have been too much to hope for. Hesitantly - apologies were not normally in his nature - he reached out with an olive branch. 

“Hey, sis -”

“Don't. Just don't.” The Daughter’s golden curls swung almost violently - although that couldn't be right. Unlike him, his sister was never _violent._

But when she turned to face him the naked hurt in her eyes stung more than any physical blow. 

Defenceless against the disarming force of her genuine distress, the Son’s fumbling words died on his tongue. Left with the sole weapon of action, he made to grab her by the arm. 

The Daughter stepped away, deliberately lengthening the distance between them. “No! I don't want to hear anything else against Father.”

He stared longingly after her as she danced down the path away from him. “I don't - understand what I did wrong!”

Her back was turned resolutely against him. “Can't you go just one day without acting out against Father? Haven't you ever thought about how it makes me feel to see the two of you at odds?”

That stopped him in his tracks. _It's in my nature,_ the Son thought silently, desperately. I can't help it any more than you can cease your endless flow of goodwill. 

With how loudly he was projecting those thoughts, it was improbable that she hadn't heard them. 

So she was ignoring him. 

Somehow, as if portented by some omnipotent prophet, he sensed that if he just let her go off now alone into the distance, something between them would be irrevocably changed. But his pride would not allow him to go after her again after she had so clearly rejected him - even if there was no one else around to witness it. 

He watched her luminous frame disappear out of sight - but never entirely out of mind. 

Finally alone, the Son set out in the exact opposite direction from whence the Daughter had headed in a fit of rebellious contrariness. 

Around him, the landscapes changed to suit his mood. Grassy plains that stretched as far as the eye could see were drenched by rainstorms. Threatening claps of thunder roared in the distance. Lines of fire, furiously defiant in the face of the rainfall, blazed a trail ahead of him. 

As the Son marched on, rage still boiling out of him, the sights and sounds around him slowly filtered out into a white haze. 

The Father was wrong. This planet had sustained them for all these countless years and was shaped for their every need. If it had ever had any will of its own, it was long burned out by the easy mindlessness of servitude. 

Really, its provisions were almost predictable by now…

Which was why the sight of the fountain interested him enough to shake him out of his simmering rage. 

He stood in a courtyard overgrown with twining vines that curled viciously around its structures, choking them and blocking all light from entering. Lifeless patches of grass crunched under his feet like the broken bones of tiny birds. There was a strange familiarity to this place, even though he was sure he had never even sensed it before. 

It was a space of death and darkness, but he sensed an overwhelming, compelling force of power emanating from it nonetheless. 

The Son extended his senses. The Father was somewhere else in the vast galaxy, off-world but pinging with annoying vitality. The Daughter was - huh, coincidentally, somewhere at the opposite pole of the planet. And, as ever, there was the great, steady hum of the planet itself thrumming like an underlying beat. 

But insistently usurping all these other signals was a black hole of energy sucking him in. If he narrowed it down, its metaphysical position corresponded with the fountain. 

_Come to me…_ It whispered to him now. _Become who you were destined to be._

A electric shock singed through his veins. He remembered it now. His dream. 

He remembered the aweing, absolute control and power he possessed. With such power he could trump even his father; he could make his sister love him again. 

_Yes... I have been awaiting you, Master. I am the Font of Power; my energy originates from the past, present and the future. It is endless; and it is all for your taking. All you have to do is drink from me._ The fountain - no, the Font of Power - continued in his mind. 

At any other time the naturally suspicious Son would have questioned its apparently unsolicitous benevolence. But just right then it felt like fate. 

He could ignore this gift and continue living a life of being unloved and misunderstood by his father and sister. Or he could take a chance and stand proud over them. 

The Son leaned down and drank deeply from the Font. 

-

The Daughter awoke feeling a deep sense of purpose and fulfillment. 

She blinked. There was a light pressure behind her eyes. But that wasn't all that was strange about her circumstances. She was naked in a small body of water - but its color was disturbingly murky. It was hardly her preferred form of cleaning herself. 

Standing up to dry herself off, she observed her surroundings.

She was in a kind of grotto, damp with droplets of water dripping from the rocky ceiling. Pulling her clothes back on she wondered why she had stumbled here for a bath. 

There was a gap in her memory; extending from sometime after her parting with Father and her brother to her dream. 

The Daughter was certain that she had forgotten something important. She felt… Different.

She had always loved both the members of her family. But now she felt the protectiveness for her father morph into obsessive control, and her frustration with her brother’s rebellion turn into a desire to govern him. 

And most essential of all, she _knew_ she could do all of that. 

It was there at the very core of her being, a ball of light expanding and expanding until she could barely breathe past it. _Power._ Unimaginable power, that even the Father could not hope to destroy by himself. And now she was both the host and master of it. 

_Yes. I, the Pool of Knowledge, have chosen you alone to be the worthy successor of my power. Now you can do whatever you wish._ It seemed to whisper in her ear. 

A slew of images flashed in her mind. _The Daughter, standing tall and proud and golden, before her brother and father with the galaxy under their rule. A matured and sensible Son agreeing instead of defying their father for once. The Father giving his children his approval for their relationship…_

She hurriedly pushed away that last image and the alarming spark of latent lust it produced. 

“What should I do?” The Daughter asked aloud. The stars that shone down at the world beyond the grotto seemed to wink at her conspiratorially. _You already know what to do._

And she did. The idea took shape in her mind and slowly she prepared her entire body for her plan. 

The smoothness of her transformation still took her by surprise. She had barely formulated her thoughts before she was already soaring high in the skies, borne by strong wings. 

All of her family possessed the ability of flight and transformation, but never had she been able to do it so quickly. 

So it was all true. She wasn't merely hallucinating or under the effects of some corrupting element in that strange grotto. This Pool of Knowledge, whatever or whoever it was, really had given her new powers. 

She flew on, gazing down at the planet before her. The first order of things was to find her brother. Father was still away; the barest of searches told her that. On and on, her tireless wings bore her. 

_There!_

Even before she sensed the Son, a strong wave of revulsion hit her. There was something powerful thrumming through the area, something that triggered an instinctive reaction within her. And underneath it was the familiar cold aura of her brother… 

Worry trumped all other impulses within her. But as she swooped down to his rescue, the realization dawned on her: her brother wasn't being attacked by the dark energy - he was the one it was all emanating _from._

The Son was lying in the centre of a dark plain. Dead things were all around him; eerily, it was almost as if he was sucking all the life energy out of his surroundings. 

A festering darkness enveloped his unconscious body - but it wasn't consuming him, it was - _protective?_

The Daughter landed possessively - no, that couldn't be right, that wasn't an emotion she'd ever thought of her brother with - on his chest. 

Instantly, the tendrils of dark energy struck out at her like attacking snakes. A swift flap of her wings dispelled them - but they reanimated at a safe distance, waiting for a lull in her defences. 

The action and noise had not gone unnoticed. The Son stirred underneath her as she returned to her customary humanoid form. “...” A pale hand, made ghoulish and unnatural by the dark light cast on it, reached up to clasp her cheek. 

It was not a gesture that was at all amiss in their previous interactions - but now she felt the chill of his touch trigger a deep revulsion at her core. There was something _wrong_ with her brother, in all of his immature defiance and irresponsibility. He couldn't understand how important it was for all three of them to live together in peace and harmony. 

But it was all right. She would make him understand now, once and for all. The peculiar feeling that had been building within her since she awoke was narrowing itself down to a thin, sharp point of purpose. 

“Sister…?” The Son croaked. His voice sounded weak. _He_ was weak. 

But that was all right too. The Daughter would destroy the darkness within him and bring him over to her side. 

“Shh,” she murmured, ignoring the disgust that surfaced within her as she smoothed a hand over her beloved brother’s forehead. “I’m going to make sure that you're okay.”

He flinched and shied away from her touch as if it burned. “Sister - there's something wrong - I feel -” He choked as an aura of light surrounded him, penetrating the tendrils of darkness that cloaked him. For the first time the Daughter realized that she was emanating a foreign - yet oh, so, familiar - light; and that that light was somehow _hurting_ her brother. 

That should have made her withdraw her hand immediately. But then the voice whispered:

 _This is necessary. Something in your brother is rotten, and you've always known it. Now you can make him_ right.

And so, with the power of the light burning righteously within her, the Daughter reached out and _pushed_ it against her brother. 

Anger, then fear, flickered across the Son’s face, contorted in agony. “Stop it, you're hurting me-!”

That plaintive plea made her heart clench. She knew she was only doing what was good for them all, but her brother was in pain. Everything in her rebelled against that; every protective instinct came to the forefront. 

_You have to do this before the Dark takes full control of him! Only you can save him!_ There was an urgency to the words that the Daughter suddenly felt herself identifying with. 

She had to do this; she had to pit her powers against her brother’s for the sake of things far greater than even them. It was fate; it might even be the first step towards their final destiny.  
But that didn't mean she had to hurt him while doing it. 

The idea came to her as naturally as all streams eventually run into a river. 

Reaching down, the Daughter lifted her skirts up. The sound of the fabric rustling alerted her brother. “What are you-” She disregarded him and continued to get her clothes out of the way. 

Her bare thigh against his clothed skin was like lava. Feeling her fingers nimbly unlace his robes, he struggled in vain. “Sister -!”

“Isn't this what you've always wanted?” The Daughter reminded, at the same time as the voice persuaded in her ear: _This is what he's always wanted._

A look that was a cross between longing and despair entered the Son’s eyes. “Not like this.”For a moment the Daughter pitied him so intensely that she almost regretted her actions. 

But only for a moment. 

Then she was undoing the rest of his robes with quick fingers. For all his shifting and shieding he was hard as a rock, and the evidence of it was clear as day cupped in her hands. 

She vaguely wondered if she should press her lips to it or stroke it to make him enjoy it more. But a downwards glance at her brother’s tortured expression made her decide to skip ahead to the main event. Her objective here was to relieve as much pain as quickly as possible. 

“This is all for your own good, Brother.” She silently willed him to understand her actions. 

A strangled sound escaped the Son’s throat as she began sinking down on his length. Despite the paralysis that had rendered his struggles up to now in vain, he managed to reach up and catch her waist in both hands in an effort to halt her. 

The momentary mix of familiar pleasure and abrupt discomfort distracted the Daughter enough for the encroaching darkness to strike again. 

And this time it was successful. With her defences down the Dark tendrils slithered through the shield of Light which encompassed her. 

Their touch was like a thousand tiny needles drilling into her skin with deadly force. She gasped in startled pain; a noise echoed by her brother beneath her.

When she opened her eyes again - with all her senses pushed to the edge she had barely registered the temporary loss of her physical vision - she saw that their forces of Dark and the Light were entangling and engaged with each other. 

Like the Daughter and the Son were. Inexplicably, instinctively, inevitably they were both attracted and repelled by each other. They were siblings and lovers; best friends and mortal enemies. They simultaneously both loved and hated the other. 

Like how she knew that she was hurting him now and while most of her still ached at the sight, some part in her righteously revelled at her mastery over him. 

As they moved together, two souls as one at last, the very elements seemed to shift and morph around them. The landscapes and skies of the planet crashed and exploded and were reborn; seas and volcanos collided and left steaming clouds in their wake. 

And of course, the Dark and the Light danced around each other in a fatal chase, encircling and empowering them. 

White noise filled the Daughter’s ears. Perhaps due to her proximity to the Son, maybe from memory of her dream; a vision stronger than any she had ever experienced before came to her. 

She understood clearly how their two paths were destined to wind and unwind down the road of their immortal lives; and the knowledge filled her with a profound mixture of sorrow and ecstasy. 

The Son must have been experiencing a similar feeling beneath her, for they tipped over the edge at the exact same time - in perfect harmony for perhaps the first and the last time in the long history of their lives. 

When it was over, the Daughter lay down with her head upon the Son’s chest, listening to the erratic, agitated rhythm of his beating heart. Although the paralysis had released him from its sly grasp, he did not move for a long time.

They were both in pain. And they both pretended they did not feel that new, instinctive repulsion from each other. Together with their union, some parts of their Light and Dark had successfully assailed them respectively. The wrongness of it echoed relentlessly in their soul like a slow-acting poison. One day it might even kill them; but for now it was to be endured.

It was a small price to pay for their yearned-for intimacy. 

Very, very slowly, a hand touched, then curled around the back of her neck. She felt the dangerous intimacy of it; it was as if he were gripping a thin stalk of a flower with a fist that could all too easily split it in half. 

The Son’s fingers tightened momentarily, enough to catch her breath in her throat if she had needed such a human way of sustenance. As it was the Daughter only felt a curious light-headedness and unbearable curiosity. 

Would he try to kill her? Had his overflowing love for her finally twisted and mutated into an all-consuming hatred? 

“Are you going to kill me?” She murmured softly. Gentle once again. That voice took them back to tranquil plains of green and chaste kisses in the meadows. 

“No,” he replied, sounding as if he were very far away. When she looked up she saw that his eyes were glassy; with tears or prophecy, she knew not. “No.”

And that was how the Daughter knew that he really meant _yes._

One day, then. One day a long time later, as yet shrouded and unclear even in foresight. She was fine with that. For now she had saved him from utter possession of the Dark. And they still had the present, that indeterminate duration of time that the planet could be so easily persuaded to shorten or elongate as they wished. 

Beyond the planet she sensed the Father returning in a blaze of anger and fear. She remembered the same emotions surfacing in the Son not all that long ago - but how long had it actually been? In their state of agony and ecstasy they might have been unconsciously copulating for centuries - and marvelled once more at the number of similarities between father and son who believed they were fated to be in disharmony. 

Their father would be angry. That was fine too. The Daughter would think of something soon. She always knew how to mediate between father and son, although she had rarely been part of the problem. 

But for now - for now, in this one peaceful moment, she leaned over to kiss him, gently, softly, slowly like he always wanted.

**Author's Note:**

> cw: sibling incest, (arguably mutual) non con


End file.
